Advice on eviction

BigAunty

silvercar wrote: »

The parents defence against the S21 would be that they are not living there under an AST and therefore can't be served an S21.

Whether the judge accepts this or not is debatable. I also wonder if the judge grants possession that means that a court has accepted the parents are there under an AST and that fact can be used going forward, therefore negating the life tenancy. Similarly, if the judge rejects the S21 on the grounds there is no AST, does that mean that a court has ruled that there is a life tenancy?

Generally, people who occupy properties without paying rent are classed as excluded occupiers. By rights, a landlord can simply change the locks. However, the landlord advice I have read say that this can stray into areas like harassment, breach of the peace or similar and that they are better off getting a court order to formalise the eviction.

So I assume this leaves a landlord with gaining an S21 for excluded occupiers as I'm not aware of any other court sanctioned eviction order. A few assumptions but I don't think there's anything wrong with evicting an EO via a court order and is there any other alternative than an S21 in England (as an S8 requires proof of grounds and the OP can't prove any)?

BigAunty

Rocky99 wrote: »

Even after everything and knowing they have very few friends and family left I know my dad's time will come in the near future and I suppose I would hate (again I know I'm a mug) to think of my mum having to cope without my dad, if anything happens I know she will ring and ask for my help (or possibly abuse me and tell me I caused his death) and I think ill end up helping.....
MUG!

All deaths are distressing, and yes, its inevitable that your mum will blame your dad's future demise on you - they do not take responsibility for their actions or decisions and seem to enjoy taunting you.

I suggest you call the Samaritans for the emotional side of your crisis for free sympathetic and confidential support.

Somerset

Rocky99 wrote: »

Somerset-
Quite frankly, how dare you!!!
Leach off my parents are you joking? Myself and my husband have worked since we were able to do paperounds, never been unemployed or out of work, LEACH of of them!!!!

Yes we took out £50000 for ourselves but this has pretty much been repaid albeit maybe another years worth of mortgage payments.
So the £100000 they had we pay for with our hard earned cash, something my parents obviously have no regard for considering they racked up at least £90000 debt.

Oh yes my poor parents, what about us, we've moved 7 times been unable to provide school shoes for our daughter while they have sat back not giving a s**t. This all happened before we told them we were sinking.

They have sent me a tonne of abusive text messages, they send a mortgage default letter on my sons birthday, and my granparents in law bumped into them in town (they don't know what's going on) and told them they were out to spend a lot of money today?
Oh yes poor parent I guess racking up yet more credit card debt.
You Somerset don't know half of the hell these people have put us through and being the youngest the other siblings done a runner as soon as possible from such self centred, horrible people.

I dare ! Someone needs to say that you are not right. You are convinced it is all their fault and none is your fault.


The leaching was in response to BigAunty's indignation of 'their' ''sense of entitlement to a standard of living higher than their daughters'' People have different standards of living - why should you have what they have just because they have it ?


''So the £100000 they had we pay for with our hard earned cash, something my parents obviously have no regard for considering they racked up at least £90000 debt.''


What is this ? You didn't give them 100K no strings. You didn't lend it. You bought a house for 100K that was then worth 250K. How do you think anyone buys a house without shelling out cash. I just cannot comprehend why you are banging on about this money like you've given it away - you bought a house.


And so what if they racked up 90K of debt. They can do what they want, they can gamble, buy a roller, go on twenty holiday's a year. They are not answerable to you. When they couldn't service the debt - they sold their house worth 250K to an investor ( that's you ) for 100K with the proviso it was rent free for life. Did you think you were doing them a favour, taking a 250k house off their hands for 100K with no obligations on your part ? If they'd sold this 250K house to a bloke down the road for !00K with no tenancy rights and no rent rebate, would you have thought that was normal ?


''Oh yes my poor parents, what about us, we've moved 7 times been unable to provide school shoes for our daughter while they have sat back not giving a s**t. This all happened before we told them we were sinking''


What about you ? It's all me, me, me. Your parents did not make your life. Your parents did not make your decisions. Your parents do not dictate your income, your job or your choice's.


You made a long-term investment, which incidentally was quite a good deal, with no foresight about how you would fund it. That's not their fault. I bought a very similar scenario several year's ago - a house, life tenant, paying £10.72 pm. That was the deal - I didn't try to weasel out of it. That would be amoral. I bought for cash but if I had bought with a mortgage or subsequently remortgaged - if I got into !!!! street later on, that would have been nothing to do with the tenant. My problems would not become her problem. She would not suddenly have to increase her rent or move out to make my life easier. Why can you not understand this ?


The other stuff you mention is relevant to you ( family dynamics etc ) but irrelevant to the legalities of the house sale at undervalue and tenancy terms you agreed to.

silvercar

Somerset, you are totally missing the point that OP did this to help parents out of a difficult situation, not to make money on the venture.

Rocky99, dealing with a father with mental health issues is not going to be easy and dealing with a bereaved mother who has coped (or not) with having a husband with these issues is always going to be difficult, let alone coping with your own loss at the same time. You will find that the landscape changes and new rules come into play. Stay strong for yourself and remember that you need to be strong enough for yourself to support anyone else.

Somerset

silvercar wrote: »

Somerset, you are totally missing the point that OP did this to help parents out of a difficult situation, not to make money on the venture.

Maybe, maybe not. It was a sweet deal and we only have the OP's version.


In any event, my suggestion earlier was ignored. Put the property into auction with the life tenancy/no rent appended. There are buyer's for this sort of property. You'd expect maybe 50%/60& of MV. Say 55% of 190K => 104.5K. Clears the 100K mortgage plus fee's. Solve's the OP's problem. Parent's get what they anticipated. Why not ?

Rocky99

Silver car -thank you!

Somerset - I never wanted an 'investment' bottom line... I wanted to make sure my dad wasn't going to try and kill himself again. You bang on about figures like I'm sitting there calculating how much money I I I could make but you couldn't be more wrong. The equity left in the house now I see as their money, the £100000 I see as their money, the £50000 we took I also see as their money which we have now pretty much paid back. Yes the house has lost around £60000 but even if the house was sitting pretty with £200000 equity in and we still had to shell out each month when we cannot afford it, I would still be going through this exact process and giving them back their money.
One thing Somerset you don't have is knowledge of my parents, I can assure you you would not be making them out as the victims, trust me

SerialRenter

Regarding the exact wording of the lifetime free rent contract.

Does it explicitly state that BOTH the tenancy was theirs until death and the rent was free until death?

My thinking is if it only states the rent is free (not free until death), surely the OP would be able to issue a Section 13 notice to increase rent.

A long shot as rent can't be changed (without agreement from both parties) during the fixed term. Is life the fixed term here? or is this some other type of tenancy such as periodic but with a clause to not end the tenancy whilst they live.

I'm not a professional in such things by any stretch of the imagination, just throwing it out there in case anyone with more knowledge than me can see a way.

The_Negotiator

Unfortunately your expectations and the legal reality are different. I guess you didn't mind spending the £50,000 that you took out of the deal on day 1? You don't get to have the upside (cheap house, £50,000 cash, help parents etc.) without the downside - paying back the loan that you took to give the above.

To date your parents have effectively given you £150,000 and in response you have given them 5 years rent - now you want to get out of this scheme by what, selling your house and giving them the remaining equity of (at a guess, after costs?) £40k - do you really think that is something they should jump at?

You are personalising a business transaction - things like what they used the money to pay are irrelevant.

You will need a good lawyer to help you in this situation.

Rocky99 wrote: »

Silver car -thank you!

Somerset - I never wanted an 'investment' bottom line... I wanted to make sure my dad wasn't going to try and kill himself again. You bang on about figures like I'm sitting there calculating how much money I I I could make but you couldn't be more wrong. The equity left in the house now I see as their money, the £100000 I see as their money, the £50000 we took I also see as their money which we have now pretty much paid back. Yes the house has lost around £60000 but even if the house was sitting pretty with £200000 equity in and we still had to shell out each month when we cannot afford it, I would still be going through this exact process and giving them back their money.
One thing Somerset you don't have is knowledge of my parents, I can assure you you would not be making them out as the victims, trust me

DaftyDuck

Rocky99. None of us have knowledge of all the personal aspects of this situation that make it so difficult for you. You are obviously struggling enormously to sort this matter out, and protect your closest family at the same time. Having just gone through the lengthy process of terminal Alzheimer's with my mother, watching her assets dwindle through care costs, worrying what would happen if her money ran out, and how I could possibly personally fund keeping her in the nursing home she was in when her money ran out was indescribably horrid. The mix of personal love (and I must admit some dislike of the personality she became) and financial worry is so destructive and confusing. I had a sibling who was far more interested in protecting "their money" before they'd inherited it, not willing to accept that it was mum's money, and she needed to spend it freely to make her miserable existence as passable as possible. So, I do have maximum sympathy for this heady mix of money & family. Oh, and I know it's too late for the adage family & business don't mix, but I see another couple of threads building of "shall I buy my father's house?", and it might be in time to warn them off!

However, there are some complexities and contradictions in trying to understand all the ins and outs of how this came about. In some ways, they aren't obviously relevant to the immediate crisis, and how to resolve it. However, if things do go to court, they may alter the attitude of any judge - if he has any discretion in the matter.


You did clearly state earlier that you "did initially see my parents house as a pension for when we were old" so, although I don't doubt for a moment that a main driving force in this was to help your parents, you were also clearly aware that there was a long-term advantage for you. You did make a clear and large gain in your initial investment (and it should theoretically be an advantageous situation to you for 15 ~ 18 years from purchase, and thereafter only mildly loss-making). You bought your parents house for less than half the market value! That's a pretty big saving.

If your sole intent was to help your dad, there would have been no need to buy the house outright; a loan secured on a charge on the house would have worked, as would shared ownership. Outright ownership, it would appear, would only really work to your advantage, and certainly not be in the best interests of your parents. This, particularly so as there was a three month interval before the infamous contract was drawn up: your parents must have been awfully trusting, or awfully naive to allow that, and any court would have to wonder at that gap.

The sale must have been managed by a solicitor: surely he advised you on the matter. If you were advised, and wrongly advised, there may be some recourse there... I'm not sure what liability a solicitor would have on such matters, but there may be some.

Obviously, your circumstances have changed somewhat for the worse, and you are pretty much unable to see this venture through. I don't agree with the tone somerset is using but, in essence, he is right that this was a potentially very profitable deal for you. It's mainly the change in personal circumstances that have unwound this. The drop in house price shouldn't be of any concern, seriously. House prices go up, they go down. The value would only matter if you were actually about to sell. So, please try not to worry over that aspect at least.

You did, in the same earlier post, state that your parents couldn't possibly pay any rent, as they barely got a pension worth mentioning. It is difficult to square this with the idea that your parents are living the high life at your expense, or that you could actually expect them (or really ever expected them) to regularly pay rent. They may well be drinking brandy over the garden wall: that's their choice, and really is nothing to do with you.

I think all contributors to this thread seem to agree that there is no comfortable end for this arrangement. However, at the moment, if you were able to step back from the immediate financial difficulty you are in, you should realise that overall this is currently still more to your advantage than disadvantage.

RAS

Rocky99 wrote: »

Thank you big Aunty, would bankruptcy mean they couldn't chase us with this 'contract', it all sounds very scary to be honest. We've ALWAYs paid up anything we owe it just doesn't feel right.

I think we are going to apply for a po just to see what happens?

Hi

I was thinking about your situation last night and I think you may both have to go bankrupt eventually, but please do NOT do that now.

Bankruptcy covers consumer debt; it does not necessarily cover secured debt. The OR may require capital items are sold or mortgaged to pay off consumer debts but it does not cover secure debts.

The time to go bankrupt is after the property is re-possessed at which point the shortfall can become unsecured debt.

It will be absolutely vital that you take good advice (and some on our BR forum here can help) because the mortgage provider will try to get you to sign documents that prevent you going BR to clear the shortfall. Do not sign anything the provider sends you or gives you to sign with taking it away and getting advice on the consequences.

The other thing is that it may be worth waiting until your parents have tried to take action against you, as you would be able to include any settlement ordered by the court into the bankruptcy.

If think you need to speak to National Debtline or Step-Change although they may only be able to refer to a specialist advisor given the complexity of this situation.

I also think that at some stage you would be advised to come clean with the mortgage provider. You really need them to go for repro sooner rather than later.